


Dream Diving with Emily Pope

by Sitriga



Category: Control (Video Game)
Genre: Altered Items (Control), Alternate Realities, Dreams, Dreams within dreams whitin dreams, F/F, SCIENCE!, Useless Sapphics, i guess
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-02-28
Updated: 2021-03-14
Packaged: 2021-03-19 05:53:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 9,618
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29745948
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sitriga/pseuds/Sitriga
Summary: Being the Director is tough work. Jesse is always exhausted. One day, when Emily has just left something on the desk and left, she fell asleep almost immediately on the usual couch. Her dream, however, was far from usual: she saw herself in a familiar glass cage in the Panopticon...
Relationships: Jesse Faden/Emily Pope
Comments: 12
Kudos: 47





	1. A Dream of Subject P7

Jesse let herself fall on the couch like it was a bed in a fancy hotel room. It didn't matter that the leather was old and peeling in places, or that there was a rather deep dip in the middle seat; she was so tired even a park bench would be attractive to sleep at the moment, even if she had sworn she would never do that again after that one time in Illinois.

She was so tired she was trying to get her desk to come to her via Launch ability, but she was having trouble making it move more than one clunky step at a time. Was it the fact she was barely focusing or that her powers seemed to be draining out too quickly? Before she could get to a conclusion someone knocked on the door. She groaned, running a hand down her face. Who could it possibly be? She told the rangers outside she was done for the day. Was it an emergency?

She used her last bit of strength to sit down and unlock the door with her abilities, a trick she'd been mastering for some time now that was immensely handy. If she had to walk to the door she'd probably leave the person knocking until they gave up, if she was honest. 

Emily entered the room with a spring in her step and the vibrant smile she wore when she had figured a solution for a challenging matter. Her hair was as perfect as always, her clothes immaculate, she looked as full of energy as if she had just woken up in the morning. Jesse was suddenly very conscious about looking like a complete wreck in front of her. She hoped Emily wouldn’t start discussing whatever she found with her, she wouldn’t be able to focus at all in that stage, and falling asleep while she talked would be very disrespectful.

Luckily, Emily was too sharp not to notice what was going on as soon as she laid her eyes on her. "Jesse, are you— were you preparing to sleep? God, I'm sorry!"

"I wasn't!" Jesse tried, but it sounded so fake she had to change subject very quickly. "What were you saying…?"

Emily furrowed her brow, put the files she carried down on Jesse's table and tilted her head slightly as she noticed it was positioned at an odd diagonal compared to the rest of the room. She looked around, searching for signs a House shift was imminent, but all she found were the obvious signs Jesse was preparing to rest and she intruded on it: Jesse’s exhausted complexion, the couch, jacket and boots thrown to the side with no care — the list went on.

"Nothing that can't wait" Emily replied, giving Jesse a knowing look. "The file will be here when you wake up."

"Are you sure I'm not going to wake up to a street sign eating people's pants if I don't take a look now?" Jesse said, a lazy smirk on her lips, but Emily looked more concerned than amused at her remarks. 

"I sure hope not! I don't know if I could stand looking at people after learning about their underpants preferences like that." Emily smiled back, impish at first but then surprisingly soft. "Please rest, okay?"

"Yeah." Jesse couldn't help but yawn. Her whole body was so heavy, she was under the impression she’d slide down the couch and pass out if she let her eyes close. "Can you throw me the blanket, by the way? It's tucked somewhere behind the desk."

"Oh, sure!" It was fairly easy to find the standard shelter-issued FBC blanket sticking out of a compartment in the desk. Jesse wasn't exactly careful when she tucked it inside. "Catch!"

She threw it, but it barely made midway to its destiny before it fell to the floor. They both stared at it for a second.

"You do need those 30 hours of field training, huh?" Jesse laughed, but even that was tired.

"Oh shut up!" Emily made an attempt at looking angry, but she almost immediately started laughing as well. She walked to the blanket, picked it up and handed it to Jesse, no throws involved this time. "Good night, and do jot down any particularly vivid dreams you have!"

"It can be relevant, yeah, I know." Jesse rolled her eyes playfully. Emily always told her to take notes; it was sweet, but she wouldn't take pen and paper to a paranatural fight, unless they were objects of power.

Emily left giggling, and the room was suddenly cold and silent again. Jesse took a second to ponder how her Head of Research seemed to embody the very archetype of the sun, carrying energy and warmth wherever she went. She could've gone further in her musings, wondering if that had a significance there inside the Oldest House or if it was a matter of it attracting archetypical people, but the truth was that she was way too tired for any of that. She could only focus on making herself comfortable on the couch, and within minutes she was fast asleep already.

—

Jesse was woken up by a strong light shining on her face. She groaned, turning on her side, and dragged the blanket over her head. If she remained still she would go back to sleep soon, and hell knew how she needed it — she could feel the dull aching on her muscles even through the haze of her half-awoken state.

Then, there was the sudden sound of a speaker being turned on, and it made her jump.

_Attention, P7: your scheduled evaluation appointment is set to start within ten minutes. Please proceed with your preparations._

She cursed mentally. Ten minutes? She was so, so tired… Fuck it, she was going to ignore that one. She needed to rest.

It felt like she'd only had time to close her eyes when the next warning came:

_Attention P7: you have 5 minutes before your scheduled evaluation appointment begins. Please get up and get ready — failure to do so will result in the revocation of your entertainment privileges._

"Fuck." Jesse groaned under her breath and kicked the blanket to the side, taking a couple of tries to sit down on the bed. She rubbed her eyes with her palm and sighed loudly, painfully - then got up in one go. 

There was nothing to see in the glass cell. It was small and unnerving, she hated it, but not as much as the assholes that issued commands from the control center up there, in that set of windows a level above her. She stared at it, fantasizing how nice it would be to hurl a giant rock right through that wall, concrete and glass flying everywhere, one of those assholes trapped under the sheer weight of it if she was lucky.

She shook her head. Death stared her in the eyes more than once. She caused it, even. It was a terrible thing, and it still haunted her in her dreams. The people up there would die for sure one day, messing with the kind of things they did, and it was probably going to be gruesome. She wasn't going to be the one to kill them, though.

Jesse went through the motions of basic hygiene and breakfast like a surprisingly dexterous zombie. When the message came to announce the guards were outside to escort her, she was chewing her toast with the enthusiasm of a funeral attendee, but she was quick to go the door. The sooner she went, the sooner it would be over, and she'd be back to the comfort of her music. At least they let her have her walkman.

The walk to the designated room was practiced, automatic. When the guards urged her past the usual door to somewhere further down the corridor, Jesse furrowed her brow in mild confusion. What did she do this time? She’d already paid her due for the lunch episode days before, what could it possibly be?

They stopped one door short of the last on the corridor, and one of the guards opened it for Jesse. She stopped right before entering, her expression going from confusion to a scowl. A test room? Really?!

"You're not Vaughn," she remarked, dryly.

The woman in the middle of the room looked eager, but also anxious behind her mask of calmness. She was stiff and held her clipboard with unnecessary strength. Jesse had become rather good at discerning signs of distress during her long years at the Bureau; she always caused it in people, voluntarily or not. Still, the glint of curiosity in that woman's eyes was genuine. Cute, even. It was a shame she would lose it very quickly.

"No, I'm not!" She smiled, offering Jesse a hand. "I'm Emily Pope, research specialist, pleased to meet you."

The guards pushed Jesse into the room and took their posts on each side of the door. Jesse just looked at Emily's hand, raising an eyebrow.

"I'm here to run some tests, if that's okay with you." Emily lowered her hand, but kept smiling.

"If that's okay with _me?_ " Jesse repeated, momentarily taken aback. She was used to orders and monotone explanations, but this? Since when did they ask for her input on things?

"Of course. They're going to be non-invasive paranatural ability measurements executed using the Charter standards. I'll be happy to explain all the procedures if you want."

Jesse scoffed, then eyed her suspiciously. That couldn't be real. "Do you really work here?"

Emily tilted her head. "Yes, have been for five years now."

"Then you've read my file."

"The part of it that was available to me, yes."

"And you're still asking me if I _want_ things?"

"Sure." She didn't bat an eye. "I prefer to do things the smoothest possible way, and that means asking for your consent."

"Like you wouldn't do it anyway if I refused!" Jesse started pacing around the lab, stopping to stare at the camera placed on the farthest corner. "What's the catch this time? Is Vaughn watching us? Darling? What fucked-up game are they playing now?"

"Dr. Vaughn had urgent matters to tend to, and I was given her time as an opportunity to collect some data. It's as straight as that. Could you please take a seat?"

Jesse turned back to face her. She looked firm and unbothered, but she was still holding her clipboard so tight her joints were white, of course she was. Jesse was oh so dangerous when she started getting angry, wasn’t she?

"What if I don't?" Jesse crossed her arms. 

Emily looked slightly disappointed. "Well, I was under the impression you liked music, from what I gathered. I even brought some tapes. Does the idea of breaking objects with your mind to the sound of rock music appeal to you?"

That was new, and surprisingly unlike the Bureau. There was no way Jesse's curiosity wouldn't betray her with such an offer.

"What do you got?"

Emily smiled, and it was warm like sunshine. "Let's take a look."

—

When Jesse heard the first notes of the melody, her legs got weak and she thought she would faint from the emotional whiplash. She hadn't listened to Metallica since Ordinary; she'd thought she never would again. It had been such a small part of her life then, and yet, if she’d known how much she'd miss it, and anything else from that time, for that matter...

Jesse only came back from her anguished stupor when the scientist, Pope, asked her if she was feeling well. Let's see: she was still locked inside that place like a prisoner but yes, she supposed she was feeling alright. Anything not to have to explain that she remembered her mother shouting for her to lower the volume on the sound system, and her father arguing that he’d been enjoying the music.

To her own surprise, Jesse still remembered the lyrics, song after song. It made the task of hurling, imploding, crumpling and smashing the most diverse mundane items on the improvised training range so much more enjoyable. She barely minded Pope there, pointing her devices and writing endless notes. It wasn't about her. It was about feeling mildly alive while reducing a construction beam to a crumpled ball, imagining it was Darling's head all the while.

"You are amazing!"

Jesse turned as she lifted a concrete box over her head, frowning with the sudden praise. Pope was there, staring at her with such awe and excitement she might as well be an old deity — or maybe a weird interplanar one, which seemed to be the sort of thing people enjoyed in this place — and it was so _weird._

"The readings I'm getting, the sheer strength you've got — you're a force of nature!" Emily completed, giggling out of pure amazement. Jesse was stuck between a confused frown and an uncomfortable stare, seeing her expression. What was that woman's deal?

"I believe the official term is 'volatile and dangerous,' but you're the one who read the reports." Putting on her calm and collected mask again, Jesse turned back to her previous task, and sent the chunk of concrete flying in a wide arc towards a metal cube. It hit so hard it could technically be called a pyramid now, if one would excuse the very irregular faces. "Done. What now? I broke all your toys."

"Yes, and it was great! and I can't wait to analyze all this data!" Emily cleared her throat when she noticed how excited she was, and de-escalated. Jesse raised an eyebrow. "That'll be the end of the tests for today, I think. I'm very, very happy with your cooperation."

Jesse never thought she'd think something like this, but already? The music was still playing, it would be a shame to leave now. "Well, as long as you let me keep the tape." She pointed towards the radio with her head.

Pope looked at it and then back at Jesse. Her smile waivered. "I'm sorry, I'm not the one who decides that..."

"Well can you ask them? It's been fucking seventeen years I didn't hear those songs, and I want them." Jesse crossed her arms.

"Seventeen?" Pope looked surprised. Jesse could see in her eyes how she was doing some internal math, probably reconsidering some information. How much did Darling not tell her? "I'll ask, I promise. Meanwhile, I think we could stay a few more minutes and branch out on the telekinesis tests. Do you think you could show me a bit of your fine movement skills?"

Jesse nodded, raising a hand. The pen Pope was using flew out of her hand and started orbiting Jesse's, drawing a surprised gasp from the scientist. 

"Hey!" Emily faked offense, but she picked up a second pen from her front pocket right after it and started taking notes. "Please refrain from taking my office supplies while you're showing off, okay? I can only communicate your astounding feats if I'm able to write my reports."

Emily was clearly expecting Jesse to take the bait and fire some witty reply, but she was confused when it prompted a weary sigh out of her. She even lowered the floating pen, making it land on her palm.

"Like they'd serve for anything other than letting Darling gauge how many layers of reinforcement he should put in my cell."

"That's not what I… I meant it as I said it. You're an outlier, Jesse. Your abilities are amazing."

Jesse looked away. Darling used to say things like that before the first incident. It was just a question of time before this woman started thinking like that too. 

From the speakers, _The Unforgiven_ played its melancholic introduction notes.


	2. Altered Item identification

Jesse woke up feeling rested, but bitter. The dream was still fresh in her mind, and she couldn't help but think of Dylan — the anger she felt in the dream, the hopelessness — that had been his daily life. He lost so much, even more than her, and It wasn't fair! He deserved the opportunity to walk out of the Bureau a free man, and experience all the things they took away from him. He deserved love, care, and a life as much as everyone else. 

_ I'll get rid of the Hiss _ , Jesse thought.  _ We're going to find a way to bring him back. You're going to help, right? _

Polaris flared on her vision, the sound of chimes bringing a familiar reassurance. Jesse realized how taut she was on the couch and took a deep breath, focusing on relaxing her muscles. She would’ve gone back to sleep like that, but she remembered she was the Director and a lot of people depended on her to get back to their lives outside the Bureau.  _ Gotta get to work _ , she thought, rolled off the couch and fell to the floor. Well, that was an effective way of getting herself alert, if anything. She was very glad no one saw her unorthodox morning routine, though.

—

"...and they woke me up with a loud message. Did they do it to you as well? It's so cruel, I… I'm really sorry, Dylan."

Jesse always found some time in her day to pass by Dylan's cell and spend some time with him. She often talked about her day, what new oddities she found within the Bureau, her impressions on people — Things she'd like to chat with him about if he was awake and well. She hoped a small unconscious part of him could register those friendly conversations and comfort him, wherever he was now. She couldn't ask for more than that.

The doors opened behind her and took her out of her own mind, which was for the best, frankly. She had to focus on the present matters, and Emily was walking towards her with her usual quick steps, probably to ask if she looked at the files she left for her. Jesse felt like she was a teenager again, being reminded of a science project she didn't even start right at the beginning of the class she was supposed to do it for.

"Jesse! Arish told me you were here…" Emily stopped before her and took a glance at Dylan. "Came to get his bulletin, I take it?"

"Yeah, and tell him about my dreams. It's so ironic, you know? When he was awake, all he did was babble about his weird dreams, and now…" She trailed off, shook her head and eventually shrugged. 

"Hm, how very interesting."

Jesse turned back to face Emily, an eyebrow raised. Emily took the opportunity to elaborate. 

"I came here to inform you I had a strange dream as well, and woke up clutching this." She showed Jesse an old tape with a faded but unmistakable label: Metallica.

_ What the fuck?! _

"That's the tape from my dream!" Her eyes widened. "You had this box full of tapes for-"

"For you to choose as we conducted tests!" Emily completed, as surprised as she could in all her practiced calm.

They exchanged a look, and it was obvious what they were both thinking: We had the same dream and a music tape appeared out of thin air — that's no coincidence.

"Is it an Altered item?" Jesse took the tape in her hands and immediately knew that wasn't the case, it didn't have the characteristic dense feeling to it, like it was a point of compressed energy.

"I believe it isn't, I've tried all known identification methods as soon as I got up and nothing elicited an altered response out of it. I was also informed the song inside is the same as the official release, but of course, the changes might be too subtle to observe without proper analysis of the soundwaves. If I take it to the acoustics lab and perform a—"

"Emily." Jesse called, before she got deeper into her own train of thought. It was true Jesse learned to appreciate how she could forget absolutely everything if you got her wrapped by a good scientific question, but right now there were other matters. "Have you eaten?"

"What?" She blinked. "I— Well…"

"Here." Jesse took a ration bar out of her pocket and placed it in her hand. "Now let's go look for whatever might've caused this dream."

—

It turned out they had exactly the same dream, but each from their own perspective. Emily filled in the details for her part as they walked, and how it complemented Jesse's: Dr. Darling called her in a hurry because apparently there was something wrong and classified with Trench that he'd have to deal with, and he was choosing to trust her with higher clearance matters, which would begin with her running some tests on a subject. In the dream it was a week after this first talk, and apparently she had written a whole paper on her impressions about the data Darling disclosed to her on the P7 case. She hadn’t known who Jesse was, nor when or how she’d come to be imprisoned in the Bureau, but she knew Jesse had a lot of powers and they tended to get out of control when she got mad. She assumed she was in solitary confinement for her own and everyone else’s safety.

They ended up in the Director's Office as Emily was telling Jesse about how genuinely impressed she had been at the telekinesis tests, and Jesse told her how she didn’t trust it at all in her side of the dream. There was a pause as they both stared at the big, ominous room. Jesse sighed.

"Well, let's get to work. What do we do?"

"We start with the identification incantations and see if anything reacts to them. Here, let me show you…"

Jesse had seen a lot of weird stuff at the Oldest House. She probably saw more on a daily basis than common folk saw in their whole lives, and even then she had to concede there was always something new and even weirder to surprise her when she least expected. This was one of such occasions: She never expected how surreal it would be to see Emily Pope, the scientific method incarnate, start saying nonsense in a ritualistic cadence that wouldn’t be out of place in a fake goth's ritual to Baphomet. To top it off, said nonsense consisting of words like barbecue and carbaldehyde.

_ What the hell is a carbaldehyde?! _

Polaris shimmered in a way that felt to Jesse a lot like a shrug.

"Did you see anything react?" Emily asked, as serious as if she wasn't doing anything out of the ordinary, and Jesse had to suppress laughter before speaking again.

"N-no? No. Everything's the same."

Unfortunately for her, Emily was very sharp in her observational skills. "What's funny?"

"No, I don't—"  _ Fuck!  _ "It's just— this incantation! It's madness, and you're so serious about it it was funny and— oh don't mind me."

"Hm." Emily made a serious face like she was considering Jesse's words, but she couldn't keep it for more than three seconds before it cracked and she started having a good laugh. "I know, right?! It's ridiculous! It works, though. Wait until you hear the other instances."

Incantation two consisted of an accelerated chant of "bread, ravine, admonished, feline". Incantation three was a deadpan intonation of a variety of words all starting with F, which Jesse was very sure was made especially to mess with the tongue, even though Emily could pronounce it flawlessly. Incantation number four was a repetition of the words "Demonstration, demonized", and it was the one that elicited a response from their altered item: the folder with the report Emily left there the night before shot up and fell open on the table, flipping pages back and forth.

It made Emily incredibly offended. "Excuse me,  _ my report  _ is an altered item?!"

"It must've been so good even the unknown forces wanted to claim it!" Jesse snickered.

"Very funny. Good thing I have it backed up in the system and won't have to write it again."

"What was it about?" Jesse asked, and she raised her hands in defense as Emily sideeyed her. "Well I couldn't read it!"

"It inquired about the correlation of the Hiss resonance invading a host's brain and the sort of dreams it triggered, apparently designed to undermine the host's will and make a takeover easier." 

"So it dealt in dreams.” 

Jesse left the thread hanging and Emily promptly caught it. “Yes, I see the correlation. It makes perfect sense, of course — but my report!”

Jesse patted her on the shoulder. “Generations of Bureau scientists will study it from now on. It'll further the cause of science!"

Emily rolled her eyes, but the words made an effect on her: she let her shoulders drop and took softened her expression. "Well, no matter. We have to secure the item." When Jesse took a step forward, she interjected. "Wait, what are you doing?"

"Securing the item?" Jesse replied innocently.

"We need a box lined with Black Rock and protective gear— Jesse!"

She had walked forward while Emily talked, and looked at her over her shoulder.

"It's a bit different for me." She smiled a relaxed smile, hoping it would reassure Emily. Jesse had done it dozens of times by now, she knew what she was doing. Emily still looked conflicted, though. Well, the proof would have to be the act itself.

Jesse put her hands over the report and light started flashing around it like projections from a prism. There was resistance between the item and her, and Jesse seemed to grab at the air like she could yank it away by brute force alone. She made a bold motion down with her hands, and the prism lights burst out like a wave, fading as the report itself phased out of the room.

Emily, who had been alternating between staring dumbfoundedly and taking notes furiously, scoffed. "Where— what did you do?!"

"Cleansed it." Jesse shrugged. "It's probably in a cell in the Panopticon right now, I'm going to call Langston to check." She started rounding the table like it wasn’t a big deal.

Emily definitely thought it was a big deal indeed, and she rushed to the table while writing at a dizzying pace. "But how did you— Jesse, I don't think anything like that has ever happened in the Bureau, you have to give me more details! How exactly do you know the items go to the Panopticon? How do you teleport them?"

"It's what happened the other times. Hang on—" she raised a finger to ask for silence. "Langston? This is Jesse. Can you tell me if an Altered Item suddenly appeared in any empty cell over there?" They both waited for the response with bated breath. "Right. No, don't worry, it should be safe. I mean, I'm sure Emily will want to get there as soon as possible to test it." Jesse grinned, laying her eyes on Emily. She nodded effusively. "So maybe be ready for that. Yeah, that's it. Thank you. Bye!"

"So it's really there." Emily scoffed and looked away, something she did when she couldn’t believe something. 

"Yep!" Jesse was still grinning. "Langston will be ready for your visit, go have fun."

"Oh you bet I will!" Emily turned back to face her and her eyes sparkled with what Jesse called the 'research fever'. "And I will want to know everything about your cleansing method when I get back. If we could replicate it, it could mean so much in terms of cleansing the Bureau of harmful energies!"

"Whenever you want." Jesse took a glance at the clock on her table by mere chance, and noticed the time. "Actually, whenever you want, after I go talk to Arish about the Hiss that’s still in the Research sector." She scratched the back of her neck.

"Of course. Our brave Director Faden must always put our security first!" 

"Emily!" Jesse groaned and pinched the bridge of her nose. 

Emily just chuckled and waved in response, quickly turning back and leaving the room.

Jesse stared at the closed door for a good moment, right at the point where Emily left. It was amazing how she still teased Jesse with the Director thing and got away with it every time; She was the only one who could, and Jesse never really knew why it didn't annoy her as much when it was Emily saying it. Maybe it was because she accepted her right from the start, with no judgement and no qualms about calling her by her name? Or was it because she had that friendly air about her that made Jesse feel safer than with other people? What if it was because she'd been feeling something electric inside every time they were being playful with each other, lately?

She stopped her train of thought right there. She didn’t want to fall down  _ that _ rabbit hole when she had to go see Arish soon. She was the Director. She had to take care of people, the Hiss wouldn't vanquish themselves, the House could get all sort of messed-up if she didn’t pay attention — her inner turmoil would only get in the way of her responsibilities.

Polaris shimmered on the edge of her vision, urging her to take a step back and actually try to think about those things.

Jesse crisped her lips.  _ You know I don't have time for that. _

The way the prisms turned and sharpened at the edges, Polaris would've huffed if she had a mouth to do it.

—

The day was fairly uneventful, as much as a day in lockdown inside the Oldest House could be. Jesse shot a bunch of Hiss, secured some more rooms to install HRA towers into, found a vending machine shifted into a wall 10ft in the air in the Investigations Sector. She made sure the rations they had were enough not to need a supply incursion in the more dangerous areas of the House for a while, ran after a couple of loose Mold Hosts in Research and sent some Rangers to the weekly mold-burning tasks. When she was finally back at the Director's Office, she crashed on the couch and fell asleep so fast she didn't even remember to get out of her work clothes. 

—

Jesse overslept. She usually relied on Polaris to wake her up at the right time, she had clockwork precision when it came to that, but this time she must've judged it wise to let Jesse rest as much as she could, by the looks of it. The clock marked two in the afternoon. 

She'd been using the Oceanview Motel for showering since she discovered she could influence its dream logic somewhat. It was simple enough to wish for a bathroom and get one inside a room, even if she had to perform assorted rule-of-three rituals to get to it. Her plan was to take a quick wake-up shower and bolt to Central Executive to learn what sort of crisis she had to deal with because she overslept, but as soon as the hot water hit her shoulders she let out a borderline vulgar sigh, and all her thoughts were pointed at how sore her whole body was. She needed to rest further, she realized, and Polaris' chimes were a gentle agreement in her ears.

_ God, when this is over I'm giving everyone a week off, including myself. I'll rent a room somewhere  _ and _ get myself a masseuse. I fucking need it. _

Polaris sent an image to her mind, and Jesse almost choked on shower water — it had to do with a familiar blonde co-worker with her hands on her shoulders.

_ I'm not _ — _ Polaris!  _

The sound of chimes ringing in her ear were a lot like a good-natured chuckle.

—

"So, what did I miss?"

Jesse took a furtive glance to the clock on the wall beyond Arish, and it informed her it was 3:26pm. How did she take that much time in the shower?! That was a disaster! She was officially a disaster Director. Bad Jesse.

"Nothing big. We're making progress with the Hiss in the Astral Exhibition, no news from Containment and Maintenance, but I believe Pope was looking for you earlier." Arish gave her his usual affectionate look and nothing more, he didn't look like he even knew of Jesse's slip.

_ Do you think people see me so busy all the time they just assume I'm somewhere killing Hiss if I vanish for a while? Because that's very handy. _

With no answer to her mental question, Jesse thanked Arish and headed to the Board Room. She always smirked unknowingly while ascending those steps. What did Emily whip up for her this time?

"Jesse, hi!" Emily was writing on one of the whiteboards to the side of the room. It was funny how they'd passed from one to three, to five, and now there were seven lining the walls; Emily worked way too much.

"I hear you were looking for me?" Jesse approached, taking a better look at that particular board. She didn't understand a thing about it, like always.

"I was. Did you sleep well?"

There was no trace of teasing in the question, but Jesse still blushed.  _ Of course she'd know. _ "I uh… Yeah. Like a stone."

"Any dreams worth telling?"

She paused, considering. "I don't remember. I think there were doctors from a psychiatric ward chasing me at some point…?"

"Wow." She snickered with the mental image. "What an interesting scenario for your mind to make."

"Not really.” Jesse shrugged. “It looked a lot like the last time it happened." 

Emily blinked, eyes widening for a second, then looked away and shook her head. She was probably berating herself mentally, if Jesse had to guess. "Sorry, I forgot."

Jesse wasn't sure of how much Emily had seen of the P7 files, since their focus had been on the P6 ones and anything they could use to help bring Dylan back from the coma. That said, they did discuss Jesse's life a couple of times in more friendly situations, and she'd mentioned how she spent a lot of time in psychiatric wards after "psychotic episodes" that were actually caused by PTSD from Ordinary. She'd mentioned with amused laughter how the staff of one of the wards was probably still looking for her after she absconded to come to the Bureau.

"It's alright. I'd love to see their faces now that I can fly and three-point land on their doorstep lifting a car with my mind."

"Please don't, we'd have to arrest you."

"Excuse me, I'm the Director!"

Emily gasped. "Abuse of power!"

They looked at each other and laughed. Emily’s laughter was so spontaneous, so different from Jesse’s. Hers was lower in tone, quieter somehow, a product of too much time afraid of expressing herself. She doubted Emily ever had that problem, she meant every word she said and everything she did, and if anyone had a problem with that they were welcome to come and sort it out. It amazed Jesse to no end how sharp she could be defending her ideas, but also how kind and helpful she usually was to people around her. 

Their eyes met when the laughter was dying. They both sustained the stare, and suddenly Jesse thought that something might be wrong - did she overstep? Did Emily actually think she meant her words?   
  
“I just— that was a joke, okay? I wasn’t going to—”   
  
“I know, don’t worry!” Emily snickered, then directed her gaze to the files on the table. She went there. picked one up and returned. “Anyway, it’s good to know you had more… Normal dreams tonight. It shows Black Rock lining works to limit the area of effect of the Report.”

“Oh, that. Is it okay if I keep that Metallica tape? You forgot to take it back.”

“I will want to conduct further studies on it at some point, but sure. Please take notes of what you feel when you listen to it, though, I’m very interested in whether or not it has any properties we weren't able to detect on the previous tests. Did you know that was the only instance of a physical object being created as a result from an event directly happening in a dream? We triggered the altered item several times and nothing like the tape ever happened.”

“So it  _ is _ special, huh.”

“I think not particularly. I believe the trick might lie either in the length and significance of the dream or the people involved; everyone knows how unique you are." She smiled, unashamed and bright.

Jesse wasn’t expecting the compliment. It hit her like a slap on the face, made her eyes go wide before she regained her cool and nodded towards Emily with a little smile. "That's a nice way to say weirdo, thanks."

"That's absolutely not what I meant." Emily tried to poke her with the back of the marker, but she dodged it effortlessly. "You're the most paranaturally-inclined individual to ever set foot in this Bureau and you know it."

Jesse's smile widened, but it still didn't betray all the buzz she was feeling inside with the compliment, even if it was completely professional. She'd become too prolific at hiding her feelings under a mask of calm over the years. It had been a matter of survival.

"So? You're the smartest person in this Bureau and you know it, Madam Head of Research. Who knows if the dream wasn't responding to  _ your _ amazing intellect?"

"It very well might be, or even to both of us. There's only one way to find out."

Emily's eyes had that unmistakable sparkle to them, and Jesse hurried to find a response to mess with her: "Tests, of course." She chuckled. "What do you have in mind?"

"It's very simple, really: You and I are going to sleep in the cell with the Report and see what happens."

"Wow, and you're not even going to treat me to dinner first?" Jesse snickered.

"...What?" Emily tilted her head.

She put a hand on her shoulder, as she did when she was embarrassed. "You know, because we… Oh, never mind."

_ Why did I have to go and say that?! God… _

Polaris shimmered in her view, her sounds like muffled laughter. Jesse scoffed at her mentally.

_ You're very cheeky these days, aren't you? _

Unaware, Emily continued pursuing answers. "We can certainly have dinner before we go, if that's the matter…"

Jesse just waved her off. 

_ Please don't make me explain the joke, it was terrible, especially because of the innuen _ — _ oh don't you dare Polaris! _

Emily watched as Jesse seemed to be having a mental argument and raised an eyebrow. She couldn't understand what caused all that fuzz. Of course she and Jesse could have dinner together, it was always awesome to have her around: She was easy to talk to, she only interrupted her ramblings about science when they had some other matter they should be talking about, and she was so kind… Plus, they'd go to the Panopticon together, afterwards. What was the matter?

"Well, that's settled then." Jesse got up all of a sudden, but as calm as ever. "See you at the cafeteria at, say, ten?"

"I'll be there." Emily nodded. "Bring your pajamas!" She giggled.

"Sleepover party, FBC style!" Jesse raised a fist in the air as she walked out. At the moment the door closed she let out the breath she'd been holding, though. Why was she so weird with people?! She probably made a fool of herself inside, and even if she could hide it very well behind her usually blank expression, she still had to feel the embarrassment of it. And now she was going to sleep in the same room as Emily and she made a terrible innuendo about it. What if she realized what she was talking about? Would things get awkward between them? Jesse didn’t want that. She just wanted to hang out with her and relax, enjoy the moment. That shouldn’t be so difficult.

_ She's going to be all focused on the test, anyway. She's not going to notice if you stare like a dumbass. You two are going to sleep for science, it's not a real sleepover. _

Her mind argued back that she didn't really know what a sleepover was like, she’d never had one. It was hard to mess up something you had no parameters for.

_ It's actually easier to mess something up if you don't know the rules! _ Jesse protested. 

She didn't want to upset Emily. She was the closest person she'd ever had after Ordinary, she was her friend; Jesse spent so long without those, she feared she wasn't good at keeping them anymore.

_ I'm glad I always have you, though. _

Polaris felt warm like a blanket over her.

—

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks TurboToast for beta reading this! You're so good at giving tips, it improved a lot because of you!


	3. Sweet Dreams and a bit of Rebellion

"So far, there are two verified ways to trigger the Report's effect: Either you fall asleep in its vicinity and it influences you passively, or you leaf through the pages and it'll induce sleep and dreaming. For this experiment, we'll try to recreate the conditions on the first dream event, so we're going to let it influence us passively. Any questions?"

"How do you know it won't just affect one of us this time and not the other?" Jesse asked, getting her hair loose from the ponytail.

Emily paused for a second. She'd never seen Jesse with her hair down and it was a sight that brought unwarranted butterflies to her stomach. There were always so many things expected of Jesse, so much she had to do, it wasn't surprising how she always seemed ready to take on an army. This moment, though, was the opposite of that: a moment of respite. The right to unbind her hair, unbind herself and rest. Emily knew for a fact it wasn't exactly easy for her to do it, so it made it even more meaningful how she was willing to be in the same room as her and let her guard down like that. She trusted her that much. It warmed Emily's heart.

However, she couldn't let herself be distracted by that. She had science to do, questions to answer. She could be silly and emotional later. "Because we've tested it. Every time there were multiple people in the room the Report acted on all of them. I had groups of two, three and four people try it, varying subjects in on themselves."

"Yeah, okay, I should know you'd cover all the bases." Jesse gave her an apologetic nod, and Emily smiled.

"Thank you. I still like to explain it, though. Are you ready to sleep?"

Jesse nodded. "Always. You?"

"Let's do it."

They both got in their respective bedrolls — which they took from spare ranger gear — and the scientist in charge of watching them from outside turned off the lights, leaving only a spotlight shining directly on the altered Report. 

Emily didn't tell Jesse, but she was the kind of person who lays down on the bed and takes a while to be able to sleep due to the sheer influx of data from the day their brain throws at them to process. She thought about various topics her researchers were pursuing and how she could assist them the next few days, about her own research, the Hiss, and Dylan. She was in the habit of keeping a notepad close in case she had an idea while she was about to sleep, so she opened her eyes to search for it and noticed Jesse sleeping on the other side of the room, face partially covered by the pillow. Like this, the calm on her face was different than when she was awake — there was a softness to it that made her look at peace, as opposed to the wary placidness she usually had going on. It put a smile on Emily's face. 

"Sweet dreams, Jesse." She mumbled to herself before closing her eyes again.

—

She was in Darling's Central Research office. He was sitting across from her on the desk like a statue, and that was never a good sign. Darling was incapable of holding still, he was always shifting and fiddling, compelled by a hundred ideas crashing inside his head like shooting stars. Unless, of course, it was something grave — then he'd stay still, probably thinking about said thing over and over until he could release the entropy of it somehow. Emily knew this time it would be by berating her. She expected it. She just didn't remember what it was about...

"Emily, first and foremost, I want to say all the data you've collected these last months has been invaluable to our understanding of applied telekinesis, parakinesiology and parapsychology."

Under normal circumstances, Emily would've grinned and thanked Dr. Darling effusively for the recognition, something he was starting to do only now after years of hard work. This time, however, she kept her expression carefully neutral. He was just stroking her ego to soften the blow, and she knew better than to fall for it.

"I think you're ready to go higher. What do you say? We could use you as sub-chief of Parakinesiology."

He chuckled, but the smile never reached his eyes. He was tense. His stiff shoulders betrayed him. 

_ He was never very good at that. _ She thought.

"That's very generous of you, sir, but as we've discussed before, I work better by being in touch with a myriad of fields at once instead of diving deeper into the one subject. I believe I'm better put to use right where I am at the moment. There's so much we can discover about innate paranaturality if we keep walking this course!"

"Oh yes, yes, I had a feeling you'd say that." Darling scratched behind his ear and pursed his lips. Hesitated. The blow was coming. "I will have to pull you out of the P7 project."

She was expecting a lot of things: heavy scolding, a monologue, belittling, even some veiled threats. She didn't think Darling would go right to the point like that, especially with such a regretful tone.

"But sir, why? We've been making phenomenal progress, I thought—"

"You're developing an attachment to subject P7." He cut her off matter-of-factly, like a teacher enumerating execution mistakes in front of the class. She hated it.

"That's not true. I am merely being friendly."

He raised an eyebrow. "Jesse is not your friend, Emily. She's a powerful and unstable parautilitarian who's confined for a reason."

"That doesn't mean I have to act cold towards her, sir. You see, I think that's actually the problem—"

"She's killed people, Emily." Darling stared right into her eyes. "Injured more than a dozen others."

That new information made Emily pause. "Can you please elaborate, sir?"

"You want to—" He scoffed and looked away, clearly incredulous, then stared back at her. "What is there to elaborate, Emily? She  _ killed _ people! Isn't that enough?"

She never looked away, or changed her tone. She didn’t know all the facts. She couldn’t judge the whole picture with pieces missing. "I just want to know the circumstances. It's useful data for a hypothesis I'm entertaining, and I'm sure it would be beneficial if you gave me a moment to explain—"

"Well I don't want to give you a moment!" He raised his voice, then noticed what he was doing and let himself fall back on his armchair. He massaged his temple like he was trying to explain something very basic to a very dense person, and it was giving him an acute headache. "You don't know her, Pope."

"And I'm gathering strong evidence that seventeen years weren't enough for you to see the obvious truth in front of you, sir: you can't raise a kid like a lab rat in a cage and expect them to be thankful."

Darling's eyes got so big they were threatening to jump out of their sockets, and he was suddenly so flustered one could think he'd been hanging upside down for a while. "How did you…?!"

The phone started ringing with a loud an ugly sound, breaking the rising tension. Darling took a glance at the light flashing — Emily could see it was the one with a six under it — and picked it up with unnecessary brutality.

"Dr. Darling." He answered. Emily saw his demeanor change to one of surprise and then indignation the more he listened to the person on the other side, and she couldn't help but wonder what could be so important to have Darling hear it uninterruptedly like that. He loved to talk over other people; loved the sound of his own voice. "I see. Please try to remain calm, Carla. I'm coming."

_ Carla? _ Emily's sharp mind was drawn to the name like it was a magnet. Carla. Carla Vaughn, the one who ran the psychological appointments with Jesse? What was going on, was she okay? Was  _ Jesse _ okay?

"I'll bring more rangers with me, yeah. Sit down and have a cup of water, I'll be right there."

Okay, it sounded like she was fine at the moment, yes, but she was about to not be anymore.

_ Please don't let them shoot her! _

Darling hung up and groaned in frustration, almost slapped his sidelight to the floor, thought better of it and took a deep breath. Only then he looked back at Emily, and she took the opportunity to fire her questions away.

"Sir, what's happening to Je—"

" _ You _ will stay here — " Again he raised his voice, almost shouting, and caught himself just in time to stop. " — while I deal with this, and then we'll finish our conversation."

He stormed out the room and Emily took a second to follow — enough for Darling to get a security guard to come and "escort" her back inside quite rudely. He took a post in front of the double doors and looked straight at Emily, who rolled her eyes.

_ Oh, now I'm a prisoner. Wonderful. _

The only thing she could do was wait, but she’d be damned if she wouldn’t make the most of her time.

—

She’d been drawing a complex graph in one of Darling’s spare whiteboards when the ranger walked in. It represented the intersections between thermodynamics, telekinesis, organic matter and unstable mindscapes as time progressed, and she lost her train of thought completely when she heard her name called. She’d known she’d probably be interrupted, but it was never a pleasant moment. She turned, the mask of professionalism already on, and waved the marker loosely at the ranger.

“That would be me.” Emily said.   
  
“Dr. Darling requests I escort you to the Containment Sector.”

There was a very unpleasant flip in Emily’s stomach. She felt ice in her hands

_ What’s going on?! _

—

There was a rock bigger than a car embedded in the middle of the P7 cell control room. It opened a gigantic hole in the wall and buried half of the thick command console under it. There was debris everywhere: Chunks of concrete of all sizes, metal plating and hardware pieces, broken glass covering the floor like glistening diamonds, paperwork. Some of the lamps malfunctioned, probably because of damaged cables. Despite the war scene, Dr. Darling, his squad of Rangers and the command room operators all turned to look at Emily when she arrived. A lot of them had scratches and superficial cuts, but none of it was serious by the looks of it. Even the guy who was pressing a coat to a large cut on his shoulder didn't look like he would faint anytime soon. 

“Thank God you’re here.” Dr. Darling pressed a button on an operational part of the console, getting closer to the intercom. If he was going to spare Emily no more than a glance, she could very well use that time to look through the big hole in the room. “Can you hear me?"   
  
Emily had never seen the P7 cell before. The farthest she was allowed to go was the corridor immediately behind the safe doors, where the test rooms were situated. Jesse had talked — more complained — about the cell sometimes, only enough to give her the idea it was small and had no privacy whatsoever. Now, the thing Emily saw was the exposed spine of what it had been, bent, crushed and twisted beyond recognition. That sheer level of destruction would've been enough to impress her, but it was nowhere close to the craziest thing going on down there: Five feet in the air and in the middle of the room was Jesse, floating completely unbothered inside a tornado of glass, concrete and broken metal. It was the most awesome and definitely most terrifying thing Emily had ever seen and yet, her heart skipped a beat in relief.

_ She's unharmed. She's amazing… _

Jesse noticed Emily looking from the hole and got up from her sitting position. She was propelled up through the air until she was at Emily's level and waved in greeting. All of the rangers immediately pointed their rifles at her.

Emiky took a step forward and waved back, gingerly.

"As you can see, Pope's here like you asked." Darling said in the intercom, and his voice reverberated through the speakers around the cell. "Please stop destroying the containment area."

The rock embedded in the room shifted, and everyone took one or half a dozen steps back from their positions. Soon it was rolling back towards the hole, and it fell with a loud bang on the floor below. The debris still left inside started flying around, rearranging itself until it formed a shifting barrier between Emily and the rest of the people and then — only then — Jesse floated inside the room.

The vortex of debris around her stopped outside and fell when she crossed the threshold, no longer supported by Jesse’s telekinesis. She stepped forward and the floating debris curved in her wake, shielding her back from harm. It looked like magic to Emily, and she abhorred the use of that term to describe anything — anything but Jesse now, she guessed. An avatar of higher fury and loss, relenting to the sight of her.

"Hi there, Pope." Jesse said nonchalantly, her lips curling up in a small smile. "Did you bring me a tape?"

_ Aw, fuck. _ "I'm sorry, I didn't have the time to look for…" She checked the pockets 

of her lab coat in a vain attempt to find anything and felt a rectangular object in one of them. She pulled it out: It was labelled as Frank Sinatra. She recognized the tape, it was hers, but she was sure she never put it there. "All I got is this classic, I'm afraid. Do you care to hear some of my music this time?"

"Will it make me sleep?" Jesse teased.

"It might. It doesn't have any of your preferred overdriven guitars on it." Emily shrugged.

"Bo-ring!" 

"That's me alright."

Jesse actually paused and gave her an appraising look. "The things I do for science." She gestured to her back, and chunks of concrete arranged themselves in a makeshift seat of sorts. "Hop in, I'll get you down."

Emily opened her mouth to question the safety of it, but she thought better of it. She took a glance at the Bureau personnel on the other side of the debris barrier, all their firearms trained on Jesse, and she decided she definitely didn't want to be like them. She sat on her concrete throne and nodded.

"You see how much better things go when we can agree with each other, Darling?" Jesse's smile widened to the point of being unsettling towards the people on the other side. Still, when she turned back to Emily, it had changed to one of excitement. "Hold on."

She took impulse and floated out of the room, carrying Emily along for the ride.

—

"You destroyed this place, threw a rock at the control room, risked being shot and got Darling down here so you could see me, is this what I'm getting?"

Emily had a sense she should be very worried. Instead she wondered why her sense of self preservation decided to malfunction all of a sudden, because her heart was pounding in excitement.

Jesse shrugged. "It's been two weeks. I was afraid Darling fired you and I'd never see you again."

"I guess you'll be pleased to know your timing was exceptionally right. He was about to."

Jesse opened a smile that was equal parts mischievous and bright, wide as Emily had never seen before. Genuine. Emily saw herself smiling as well.   
  
“Did you tell him to shove it?”Jesse clicked her tongue.

Emily’s eyes widened. “Of course not! He’s my boss!”

“Boring.”   
  
“I told him he couldn’t keep you in a cage and expect you to behave.”

Jesse opened her mouth for a moment, her brow creasing in confusion, but it was suppressed as soon as it came. “Yeah, that would do it. You’re so lucky I’m here, Pope... Now tell me: do you want to stay?”   


Emily saw Jesse, usually sarcastic and fearless, always unbothered in the face of whatever the Bureau threw at her, waiver with her question.  _ Do you want to stay? _ Emily processed the question in her mind. It was weird. Jesse, vulnerable? It suddenly clicked — What Jesse really meant was:  _ Do you want to stay with me? _ She realized she had an answer to that on the tip of her tongue already. “Of course I do! Who else would bring you science and songs?”

Jesse’s smile returned, and it was everything Emily had hoped for.   
  
“I can even stand this Frank Sinatra guy for that.”

—


End file.
